ORNL, Chattanooga work to solve traffic woes

Tuesday

Jan 14, 2014 at 6:53 PM

Imagine you have an early morning appointment in Knoxville and at midnight you realize you have two flat tires. You grab your smart phone and make a quick reservation for a rental car since you can't miss your appointment.

Russell Langley/The Oak Ridger

Imagine you have an early morning appointment in Knoxville and at midnight you realize you have two flat tires. You grab your smart phone and make a quick reservation for a rental car since you can't miss your appointment. In the morning, your rental car arrives. As the car drives off to the destination preprogrammed into the GPS you realize how strange it is that you are the only occupant of the car — and no person is driving.

That is just one of the future scenarios discussed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory last Friday.

Jan-Mou Li is an ORNL scientist who specializes in vehicle systems research and traffic engineering. John Van Winkle is the traffic engineer for the city of Chattanooga and Stephen Meyer is a branch manager for Alfred Benesch & Co. and a mechanical engineer. The three of them have worked together on technology to solve the traffic issues of Chattanooga.

Through the use of intelligent transportation systems it is hoped that the detection of and reaction to traffic congestion and problems can be improved, Li said.

Presenting traffic congestion cost data from 2011, Li said 5.5 billion hours were wasted in traffic congestion and 2.9 billion gallons of fuel — enough to fill four New Orleans Superdomes — were wasted at a cost of $121 billion in the United States. In order to arrive on time for important trips of 20 minutes, 60 minutes had to be allowed to account for traffic. In 2011 the cost to the average commuter was $818 compared to $342 in 1982.

To help fix these problems, Li proposed enhancing perception, communication, and action/reaction to road conditions. Under perception, engineers must become aware of the problems through some type of sensor system. Once the problem is perceived it must be communicated to the right people who can take the necessary course of action to resolve the issue. Li works with Van Winkle and Meyer in studying the data obtained by the sensors installed in Chattanooga. It is through this data that they are hoping to improve the traffic flow in the city.

Enter Van Winkle, Meyer, and the Wireless Mesh Network of Chattanooga. Through the use of various grants and other funding sources, the city has been able to implement a network of wireless sensors to monitor traffic on some of its more heavily traveled routes. The use of this data enables Chattanooga city staff to react to traffic issues in a quicker manner and resolve the issues before they cause further problems.

The advanced traveler information systems work through the Internet and smart phone apps to alert individual drivers about traffic congestion. Those drivers can then avoid the congested areas, giving responders time and space to clear the problem.

To date, 30 to 35 percent of this network has been deployed in Chattanooga, Van Winkle said.

Improving the flow of traffic in any city does more than just alleviate congestion, Meyer said. There are also positive impacts for public health and reductions in air pollution.

When asked if such a system could benefit a city the size of Oak Ridge, Meyer said, “Every city has problem roadways that can be improved.

“These vendors have systems in various sizes to accommodate any size city," Meyer said in an interview.

Traffic congestion in cities has reached the point where something beyond road construction needs to be done.

"We can't build our way out of this, we have to use the technology that is available," Van Winkle said.

One step being taken in the direction of easing congestion is the development of driverless vehicles. Called "autonomous vehicles," the federal government is encouraging research in their design, according to Meyer. In an August 2013 article in The New York Times, Nissan executives claimed they would be ready to release these vehicles in 2020.

A search of the U.S. Department of Transportation website revealed that the agency has concerns about driverless vehicles. They are taking steps to ensure that safety devices are built into the vehicles that allow for quick conversion to human control.